Suspected East Area Rapist to appear in court as sadistic portrait emerges
CITRUS HEIGHTS, Sacramento County — The ex-cop and retired grandfather accused of terrorizing California with a series of rapes and killings — spurring a decades-long manhunt that ended this week — committed most of his homicides during a rampage that began three months after he was fired from his job as a police officer in Placer County, police said.
Investigators in several counties were building cases Thursday against Joseph James DeAngelo, who was named a day earlier as the notorious Golden State Killer and East Area Rapist, but they could not explain why he allegedly launched into his prolific spree or why he apparently stopped cold more than 30 years ago. .